A workshop on grassland fungi, September 2026

The Ängsvampsworkshop in the Swedish Mycological Society's calendar takes four days, from 24 to 27 September 2026, and concerns a group with a special standing in conservation mycology.

Grassland fungi, ängsvampar in Swedish, is a collective name for species associated with extensively managed meadows and pastures. They include above all the waxcaps, that is the genus Hygrocybe and its relatives, and alongside them the club and coral fungi, the earthtongues and some pinkgills. What links them is not kinship but habitat and requirements.

Those requirements are the heart of the matter. Grassland fungi grow in swards that have gone decades without ploughing or nitrogen fertiliser, and they disappear quickly once either happens. Their presence is therefore information about the management history of a plot, not merely about how it looks today. A sward looks much the same a year after fertilising and after a century without it — and the fungi show the difference.

Hence their role as indicators. In many European countries the number of waxcap species on a site is used to assess the conservation value of grassland, and sites rich in these fungi are protected on exactly that basis. The problem is that identifying them is difficult: species differ in shade, in sliminess and in smell, and those features change as the material dries.

That is why the workshop lasts four days rather than one. Working with fresh material, in the field and under the microscope, is the only route to competence here — an atlas is not enough, because the differences often fall below the threshold at which a photograph records them.

The date at the end of September is not arbitrary either. Grassland fungi fruit late, usually after the first cold spells, and their season is short. Anyone wanting to see them has to hit a narrow window, and that is a further reason why data on their distribution is gathered with such difficulty.

Two field days followed by identification work

The Östergötland workshop is based at Borghamns Strand hostel. On Friday and Saturday the schedule starts fieldwork at 09:00, returns around 15:00 for identification and reviews finds in the evening. Targets include waxcaps, earthtongues, Dermoloma and club fungi of meadows and pastures. The SEK 2,500 fee covers activities and three nights in a shared double room, but not food.